Some recipes are far more trouble than they are worth. We have made more than our fair share of dishes that take hours and involve dirtying up every single pot and pan in the kitchen, but turn out to be just ok in the end. Other recipes are so simple and come together so quickly that you can't imagine that they will be that good in the end. And then they end up blowing you away. Those recipes are few and far between, but this dish happens to be one of them. There are less than 7 ingredients total in the entire dish, but there is so much flavor. The broad bean paste gives the dish heat, but what I really enjoyed is the combination of ground beef and Chinese celery. The meaty, rich flavor of the ground beef is a really good counterpoint to the grassy, distinctly herbal flavor (and crisp texture) of the Chinese celery. I don't know how substituting regular celery for the Chinese celery would affect the dish, but I would definitely be willing to give it a shot. I think if you use regular celery the recipe says that you need to peel the little celery strings off, which seems a little finnicky and irritating, but such is life. If the flavor of the final dish is a rough approximation of the flavor of the Chinese celery in this dish, I would make it again and again.
Recipe after the jump!
In mid-April I started thinking tacos and Cinco de Mayo. Mexican food screams warm weather to me and I have been dreaming about warm weather since about December... If only I had visited the farmers' market on Monday I would have made these charred asparagus tacos for Cinco de Mayo but I didn't have time to visit the farmers' market before today. Before today I hadn't been to the farmers market in 2 weeks so I was pretty excited when I went today and saw all of the fresh spring veggies. Thank goodness for spring! I was so sick of winter and so very excited for fresh asparagus. When sugar snaps finally make it to the farmers' market I will do a giant happy dance. Moving on. My other Cinco de Mayo alternative was to make carnitas (Smitten Kitchen posted a slight variation on Homesick Texan's carnitas recipe and it looks super simple and tasty and Bon Appetit has a Beer-Braised Carnitas recipe that I find intriguing), but because Cinco de Mayo fell on a Monday this year it wasn't going to happen. I don't know about you, but I am barely prepared enough on Monday to throw something together - roasting or braising pork shoulder for 2-4 hours (or cooking it all day a slow cooker) just isn't going to happen.
So I guess you can fairly say that this recipe was my backup. Alex occasionally orders chicken tacos but I don't think I ever do. Then again, I do like chicken enchiladas so I guess it's not all that different. But chicken generally seems like such a cop out to me. I decided to try out this recipe anyway because what did I have to lose? It sounded good and the pictures looked good. And to be honest, I didn't have anything else planned. I was looking for a little more depth of flavor - instead I mostly tasted the chipotles and adobo sauce. And once I topped the chicken with tomatillo salsa I mostly tasted heat. The tomatillo salsa added brightness and acidity, but I wish we had made an equally bright and spicy pineapple salsa or maybe a mango salsa instead. I think a little sweetness would have been a good counterpoint to the chicken tinga tacos and some textural contrast would have been a really welcome addition. With the salsa and the braised chicken you ended up with a mouthful of fairly wet and somewhat mushy taco. Pineapple would provide some texture, but adding jicama to any salsa would work too. If you do make these tacos, make sure to drain the chicken fairly well before putting it on the tortilla. Same goes for the salsa. Otherwise you end up with a pool of liquid in your taco, which leads to a rapidly disintegrating corn tortilla...
Recipe after the jump!
This is totally embarassing. Alex and I made this roast chicken back in February or March. And then I forgot to post it. I really thought it was up on the blog. And then I was looking today today at other recipes that I had bookmarked to try and came across the draft of this post. The recipe was on there, the picture was too (even though it's not a very good picture), but I never got around to adding any text. Fail.
Roast chicken is one of my favorite things if it is well done. And Peruvian roast chicken seems to be, on average, a lot better than your average roast chicken. I don't know how they season it traditionally but their rotisserie chicken is magical - even the white meat is juicy and flavorful. I also love that spicy green sauce you get at Peruvian restaurants to go with their roast chicken. It's pretty much the best thing in the world. So it's a little shocking that it took me this long to make it at home. In my defense - it turns out that there is a whole lot of mayo and sour cream in the sauce. I don't know why the addition of mayonnaise and sour cream to a sauce that I know will be spicy and delicious bothers me when I make it at home, but it throws me for a loop. However, I am going to have to get over it because this stuff was pretty delicious. It's creamier than what I usually get at the Peruvian restaurants that I go to, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. It also doesn't taste quite the same, but for a homemade version (that we adapted from Serious Eats), this was close enough for government work. Ours had some pretty good kick so if you want your green sauce a little milder, leave out some of the jalapeno seeds.
Recipe after the jump!
I love traveling but sometimes, when I get back, all I want is salad. I was in Miami for work last week and when I got back yesterday all I wanted was a salad. So we made some brook trout with this Make-Ahead Radish Fattoush Salad. And then I also had a salad for lunch. Tonight for dinner I wanted something relatively light, but flavorful. I also wanted something that didn't remind me of all of the buffet meals (some of them were pretty decent, but most were pretty blah) I had all last week. This dish was basically the antithesis of the random meats, pastas, sandwiches and salads I had last week. The best part of each meal was the desserts so I had more than my share. Strangely enough, one of the best meals I had last week was the shrimp po' boy that I had at the Fort Lauderdale airport. How random is that? Granted, it had coconut shrimp in it - and who doesn't love coconut shrimp? Given the number of desserts I ate and the shrimp po' boy, it's no wonder I feel like I gained 5 lbs while in Florida.
This post has been weeks in coming. I keep planning to make more Chinese meals for my very very belated Chinese New Year meals. I'm 3 months late at this point, so I guess another few weeks won't make much of a difference. I really am going to try to finish all of the posts up by the end of May. I actually had another tofu recipe picked out for Chinese New Year but I decided in the end to make this dish because it looked easier (and healthier). Everything in the dish worked together in a really interesting way. I loved how soaking the celery, cilantro and scallions in an ice bath made them crisp and refreshing. The sauce was really savory - nutty, spicy and funky. It wasn't my favorite sauce, but it was one of the more interesting Chinese sauces we have made recently. One thing I might recommend is another cooking/heating method for the tofu itself. Microwaving it made it release tofu water which diluted the sauce. So I would either microwave it in another bowl and then transfer it (minus the water) into the serving bowl. Or I would try steaming it. Steamed soft tofu ends up with a better silkier and more custard-like texture to it.
Recipe after the jump!
Pesto usually leaves me feeling a little... blah. I like it on a sandwich or as the sauce on a pizza, but there has to be more stuff going on. A plain pasta tossed in pesto has always struck me as being a little boring. This pesto is far from boring. The combination of basil, mint and fennel seeds (who puts fennel seeds in pesto?) makes things a lot more interesting. And I really like the addition of serrano chilis and dried chili flakes - they give the pesto great kick. You don't want to make this pesto if you are afraid of a little heat. The post on Serious Eats suggests that the sauce has "gorgeous hints of subtle spice" but this isn't a gentle hint of background heat. It should also be said that this pasta doesn't have the level of spice you would expect from a Sichuan dish either. All things considered, this was a pretty interesting take on a simple pasta tossed in pesto that is relatively easy to throw together. There are other pasta dishes that would make my easy mid-week pasta repertoire before this one (including this Pasta with Caramelized Cabbage, Anchovies and Bread Crumbs, this Pasta with Sun Gold Tomatoes or this Spaghetti with Garlic and Oil). But I could see myself making this variation of pesto again. And this pesto might make me reconsider pesto as a delivery method for any number of different seasonings and ingredients. Overall I consider that a win.
Recipe after the jump!
This weekend seems to be the weekend for posting about hunks of roasted meats. On Saturday I posted a roasted pork shoulder. I finally got around today to posting about the honey-glazed roast duck that we made from Ed Lee's cookbook back on New Years Day. Pathetic, huh? I have no real excuse for being so delinquent in my posting, except that work is busy and we have been traveling a bit. It is particularly sad given how incredibly excited I was by this meal (both before and while eating). My laziness has nothing to do with how much I liked this duck. I LOVE duck in general and I thought this roast duck had really good flavor. It's no replacement for Peking duck, but it was a nice take on roast duck. My biggest compliant about the duck was that the skin needed to render more. It was still fatty and not at all crispy. It was more... sticky (and a little rubbery). I dunno if our duck was just fattier than the duck that Ed Lee uses - he might use some sort of free range duck with more flavor and less fat. But it was still really good. I loved the bourbon-pickled jalapenos that we served with it - they were the perfect boozy, sweet and spicy accompaniment for the richness of the duck and the sweet flavor of the glaze. Definitely serve the duck with some herbs and thinly sliced cucumbers because that freshness also works to cut through the fattiness of the duck.
Recipe after the jump!
Happy Belated Thanksgiving! I don't know about y'all, but as much as I enjoy Thanksgiving, it wrecks me for weeks to come. Too much starch, too much dairy, too much dessert, too much...well everything really. Alex and I got back to NYC last night after spending Thanksgiving with his family and all I wanted for dinner was either straight up veggies or seafood. We settled on sushi - low carb, no dairy and simple. Well, I assume it's not that simple for the people preparing it, but it doesn't get much simpler for us than picking up the phone and ordering delivery. Today we are having a very simple kabocha squash soup for lunch and some swordfish for dinner. I can't even think about another plate of turkey, stuffing or corn pudding for at least another month.
This tofu dish would have made a good weekend after Thanksgiving meal too - it is satisfyingly spicy and tasty, while still being pretty simple to prepare. We actually made it the weekend before Thanksgiving, but I didn't have time to post it before the holiday. If I have my way I will be digging into the leftovers shortly. My favorite thing about this recipe was how the flavors of the smoked tofu and the 5-spice seasoned tofu combined with the sauce. We used a combination of the two because we had both in the fridge and it just seemed like a good idea. We also didn't have quite enough of either to make the full recipe - either we made a half recipe with one type, or we combined both and made the full recipe. And as much as I love smoked tofu it can get a little overwhelming. The sauce is assertive enough that you would probably be ok using just smoked tofu, but we figured why not combine the two? I love the texture of pressed tofu, which is firmer and has more of a springy/chewy texture than even extra-firm tofu does. We typically use smoked or seasoned pressed tofu in simple salads with celery and peanuts, like this Smoked Tofu with Celery and Peanuts. Mark Bittman also has what looks like an interesting take on the classic Celery and Tofu Salad that I want to make the next time we hit Chinatown for groceries. We served the tofu with some sauteed bok choy with garlic and it was a perfect, light and easy meal. And it was about as un-Thanksgivingy as it gets. Yum.
Recipe after the jump!
I love kale salads. And yet, so many of the ones we make at home are vaguely disappointing. I feel like it's tough to strike the right balance with a kale salad - you need the dressing to be fairly assertive because kale is a hearty little green with a slightly bitter flavor. If you try to dress it the same way you would dress baby spinach or really tender young salad greens with a light balsamic vinaigrette it's just not going to work out. But sometimes the dressing just goes a little too far in the wrong direction and gets too assertive and you lose the kale. I have been trying for months to come up with a spicy Asian kale salad with cashews (for some reason I am really stuck on the cashews) and I keep failing. The first time the dressing wasn't flavorful enough and the second time it was too harsh. It was a bummer. But this recipe is a wonderful quasi-Asian take on a kale salad that combines two of my favorite greens/vegetables - kale and brussels sprouts. It has great flavor - bright fresh herbs, slightly bitter greens, and fried greens all tossed in a spicy fish sauce vinaigrette. And it has wonderful texture. But I should point out that it is labor intensive. Alex took one look at the recipe and his comment was "at least you picked a simple recipe for dinner." I believe my response was along the lines of if he does the menu planning in the future he can avoid over-complicated salad recipes, but until then... We will make at least one change in the future to simplify the recipe a bit - roasting the kale and brussels sprout leaves in the oven saves us the time, aggravation and oil spatter of frying them in small batches. I really liked the crispy texture and the nutty, concentrated flavor of the fried kale and brussels sprouts because it added depth of flavor and additional texture to the salad. But you can achieve a nearly identical result (without risking third degree burns) by roasting the kale and brussels sprouts in the oven. I'm also tempted to try to transform this into an entree salad by serving it with some tofu (we might roast that too) or shrimp. I will probably play with it a little more, but I really liked this salad and aside from tinkering with the cooking method out of self-preservation and laziness, there isn't anything else I can think of that I would change to the base recipe. As a side note, just because I found this recipe doesn't mean I am going to quit my quest to find a perfect spicy Asian kale salad. I'll get there eventually.
P.S. The picture sucks because we misplaced the memory card for our camera and had to use my cell phone. And my iPhone 5s (which has otherwise taken excellent pictures) absolutely and utterly refused to cooperate.
Recipe after the jump!
There is a restaurant in the East Village called Mercadito that has the best shrimp tacos I have ever tasted. They also make really good fried fish tacos and guacamole, but it's the shrimp tacos that really stick with me because the shrimp are in this creamy, spicy chipotle sauce that I love. Yum. About a month ago I saw a recipe on People.com for those tacos and I got really excited. We had originally been planning on making a variation on some shrimp tacos that I had at Nada in Cincinnati, but I got all excited when I saw this recipe. The tacos were good, but I'm not sure how faithful they are to the recipe that the restaurant actually uses. At the very least, they have to puree the chipotle sauce because the shrimp is bathed in a really creamy, spicy and rich sauce at the restaurant with no discernible chunks. This version was a lot more rustic (and a lot spicier than I remember), which isn't necessarily a bad thing. The sauce was a lot thinner - I think to replicate the sauce you would have to add some more butter and puree. It might need a little something to give it some more oomph. I didn't bother to take a bunch of pictures trying to get a really nice one because the tacos looked like a mess on a tortilla and there's really only so much you can do about that. So long as you aren't afraid of mess, spice or chipotles, they are very tasty. These aren't the best shrimp tacos we have ever made, but I would make them again with a few minor tweaks.
Recipe after the jump!
I was really intrigued when I saw a recipe for broccoli rabe in Naomi Duguid's Burmese cookbook. Broccoli rabe is not a traditional Asian ingredient so I had to pause and take a look. I'm a big fan of broccoli rabe, but Alex doesn't enjoy the inherently bitter flavor of broccoli rabe quite as much as I do. And to be perfectly honest, it took me awhile to learn to like it. I keep hoping that one day it will grow on Alex too. Left to his own devices he likely would not have made this recipe, but I took the decision out of his hands by going to the farmers' market near my office and picking up the broccoli rabe specifically to make this recipe. Unsurprisingly, he said the dish was "fine" but "not his favorite." I knew going in that would be another dish that I would probably like more than him. There are a few things I can say unequivocally about this dish. First, it has a lot of flavor. Broccoli rabe has a lot of flavor in and of itself, but as with the other recipes we have tried from Naomi Duguid's Burmese cookbook, the dish picked up a surprising amount of heat and flavor from simmering for 3-4 minutes. Second, it seems that all of the recipes from this cookbook are quite... wet. It seems that the Burmese are really into simmering dishes in very thin sauces. The Chinese tend to add cornstarch slurries to their stir-fries to thicken the pan juices into a sauce. They also tend to stir-fry rather than simmer. Given the dishes we have made from our cookbook, it seems that the Burmese have a different (but equally flavorful) philosophy.
Recipe after the jump!
I don't have a lot of experience with Burmese food, but I got pretty excited when I saw that Naomi Duguid had a new cookbook. Hot Sour Salty Sweet is one of my favorite cookbooks and I'm always thrilled to try new cuisines and cookbooks, especially when I have reason to think that they might be good. Given the author and the general beauty of the cookbook I had pretty high hopes from day one. For our first meal I bookmarked a number of recipes and then let Alex pick which one(s) to make. One of the great parts of being an attorney is an endless supply of flags and post-its, which I put to good use marking documents (as well as cookbooks). He picked the chicken and I decided that we should make the simple cabbage-shallot salad to serve on the side. It didn't occur to me (although it really should have) that both recipes would be on the spicy side. I'm pretty good at entirely ignoring aspects of a recipe while salivating over it. I usually do that with the amount of time it will take to make something (long marinades or braises always kill me), but it never really occurred to me just how many cayenne chilis these recipes called for. Granted, the chicken is much spicier than the cabbage-shallot refresher, but neither one is suitable for people with a wimpy palate. If you like just a hint of heat, go with the cabbage-shallot salad and maybe cut back on the chili a little. I would pick an entirely different entree because the spicy punch of the chicken really makes the dish shine. It's spicy and funky and fun. The next time I make the chicken I will probably cut the amount of water in half and/or add a little cornstarch slurry to the dish to thicken it up a bit. The ju-ju (for lack of a better term) is pretty thin and watery, but if you thickened it up a bit I bet it would be delicious. The chicken itself absorbed a ton of flavor from the ju-ju - heat being one of the predominant flavors, along with the savory flavors of ginger and garlic and the tartness of the lime juice. It was really good, and very different.
As for the cabbage-shallot refresher, I would totally serve this with both Asian and non-Asian meals (with a few minor twists). For instance, I could totally see skewing it a little Latin and using it on top of tacos or serving it with enchiladas. I liked how bright and fresh it was.
Recipes after the jump!
Clearly I am fickle because I just found my new favorite watermelon salad. And I think I declared my previous favorite (Hugh Acheson's Watermelon-Feta-Arugula Salad with Serrano Chili Vinaigrette) about two weeks ago. So it had a short but well-deserved reign. Both watermelon salads have a wonderful balance of sweet, spicy and savory, but this one won by a nose. I think it was the addition of the Thai basil and radishes. I really liked the crunch and the slight peppery flavor of the radishes, as well as the peppery fragrance of the Thai basil. And the fish sauce. I don't know. It just works so well. I wasn't sure how I was going to feel about the radishes with the watermelon, but it worked. It's light and refreshing, but full of punch Asian flavors. And Asian flavors beat feta cheese for me 9 times out of 10. I really enjoy feta cheese but I love fish sauce. After eating a fairly heavy meal at The Marrow last night (duck schnitzel, crispy kale with scallops and bone marrow with uni anyone?) and greasy Chinese at my desk for lunch, I really needed something light for dinner. This salad couldn't have been more delicious. Note to those who don't love spice - you're going to want to cut back on the amount of sambal oelek and chili or seed your chili prior to throwing it in. Just like Hugh Acheson's recipe, there is some fairly serious kick to this dish. Another note, if you're a Top Chef nerd like I am, it's kind of funny to compare recipes between Tom Colicchio and Hugh Acheson since they are both judges on the show and Hugh was a contestant on Top Chef Masters a few seasons ago.
We served the watermelon salad with sizzling ginger-lemongrass tofu. We had a block of handmade firm tofu from The Bridge that I picked up at Fairway that I wanted to use and I wanted something different. So we went with another recipe from Food & Wine that sounded like it would be a good pairing with the watermelon salad. If you can find tofu from The Bridge in your local Whole Foods I would highly recommend it. It had a really nice firm, but still creamy texture and it had more flavor than your average block of supermarket tofu. It was really good. I can't wait to try it in other dishes. As for this dish, it was good. I'm always surprised how much flavor a dish can pick up by just sizzling some aromatics. And it did go very well with the watermelon salad. I would totally make them together again in the future.
Recipes after the jump!
Last June I saw this recipe on Serious Eats for Corn Som Tam and got all excited. Then life got in the way and before I knew it corn season was over at the farmers' market so I never had the chance to make it. It was very sad. But as soon as I saw the fresh corn at the farmers' market this morning I knew we had to make this. So I spent a little time on my iPhone figuring out exactly what ingredients we needed (the rock shrimp was an impulse buy yesterday afternoon) and we picked up cherry tomatoes, some beautiful haricots verts and corn. Then I hit the grocery store for more limes and shredded carrots. It has been a really long time since I have had the time to sit in the kitchen and take my time making a meal from scratch so this was something of a fun zen experience for me. Most meals of late have been hurriedly thrown together (mostly by Alex, with some fly by assistance from yours truly) in brief breaks between doing work, but I had the whole afternoon to myself today to play in the kitchen. I made a hell of a mess (and Brady helped by leaving green bean bits all over the floor), but I got to make lunch all by myself! This might not sound exciting to most of you, but I really miss cooking when work becomes all-consuming. Don't get me wrong, it's great when Alex cooks dinner because he is a pretty darn good cook, but I miss being able to cook and menu plan at my leisure.
As far as som tams go, I might prefer the version with green papaya for the interplay of texture and sweetness, but this was a nice summery alternative. I love Thai flavors, fresh corn salads and great summer produce so this recipe combined a number of things that I enjoy. I think this would make a really nice component of a larger meal but it's pretty light to be the only dish. If I had been cooking lunch or dinner for 4 (or more) people, I would have made a larb or maybe this Crying Tiger Grilled Steak to go with the som tam.
Recipe after the jump!
I know I referenced this recipe weeks ago and promised to post about it. And then I didn't. This isn't going to be the longest post ever but I know myself and if I don't get something up about it now it's not going to happen. So here goes. This recipe was the first recipe we made from Hugh Achesons' cookbook and I loved it. The serrano chili vinaigrette is not shy - it's spicy. But it works really nicely with the sweet watermelon. If you don't like spice, you should cut the number of chilis in half (or seed some of the chilis). We like spice so we went whole hog, but I think it would be a little too spicy for a lot of people. Anyway, I know we have made a number of watermelon salads on this blog (I have a thing for watermelon salad), but this might have been my favorite one ever. It had a perfect balance of salty, sweet and spice. Sometimes the cheese can throw off the sweetness and freshness of the watermelon (particularly if your watermelon isn't very sweet), but this salad retained all of the fresh and bright flavors that I love and added some kick. We did cut back on the amount of cheese slightly, but that was due to the fact that we ran out (not because I made the strategic decision to do so). I thought the amount of feta was fine as we made it so I will probably continue to use a little less cheese than the amount the recipe calls for in future watermelon salads. But if you want a fun and funky take on a classic summertime treat, make this salad. If your tastes are at all similar to mine, you will love it.
Recipe after the jump!
I have a new favorite cookbook. I know it's a little ridiculous to call something my new favorite cookbook when I have only made a salad and a condiment from it, but I LOVED both of those dishes. And the only reason I bought the cookbook is because it was on sale at Anthropologie. I didn't even realize they sold cookbooks but it was on sale, the pictures inside were pretty and Hugh Acheson is perhaps my favorite Top Chef judge of all time. So I bought it. And I am genuinely (and thoroughly) excited by a number of recipes so it worked out really nicely. Stay tuned. If I had my way (instead of work having its way with me) I would have made at least 3-4 other recipes from the cookbook already. I have 4-5 more recipes already bookmarked that I want to make as soon as possible. I promise to make more as soon as I can. I guess I should mention the name of the cookbook sooner or later - it's A New Turn in the South: Southern Flavors Reinvented for your Kitchen by Hugh Acheson. It helps that I am in a Southern phase recently - this weekend we had great meals at Maysville and Mighty Quinn's Barbeque. I didn't take any pictures since we were at both restaurants with friends, but they were both totally yummy. Every year summer hits and I start thinking about Mexican food and Southern food. I want tacos, barbeque, buttermilk biscuits, cornbread and beer. And tonight, Alex really wanted grilled cheese, which isn't exactly Southern, but it's not not Southern? I had mentioned grilled cheese as a natural pairing for these pickled tomatoes when I asked Alex to make them last week, but I didn't know that Alex was going to get so fixated on the grilled cheese idea. I went to the farmers' market this afternoon after the gym and was ready to make a peach, prosciutto and mozzarella salad for dinner but Alex was dead set on the grilled cheese with spicy pickled tomatoes idea. I picked a rather labor-intensive grilled cheese recipe from Serious Eats that I saw a few months ago because I always feel like our grilled cheese sandwiches aren't as crispy as I want. This grilled cheese took awhile, but it was perfect. And I do mean PERFECT. As far as methods go, I don't think it can be improved upon. I might experiment with adding new ingredients in with the cheese (or try other cheeses or types of bread), but I have never had such a nicely cooked grilled cheese. And the spicy pickled tomatoes were delicious. It was such a fun play on grilled cheese with tomato soup (or ketchup). The acidity and heat of the tomatoes really complimented and cut through the richness of the grilled cheese. I can't wait to try these tomatoes in other dishes - I'm thinking cornmeal-crusted chicken breasts or sauteed chicken breasts. I don't know, but I think these tomatoes are the perfect thing to keep in the fridge at all times to really jazz up a meal.
Recipes after the jump!
For some reason on our last trip to Cost Co I decided to pick up a can of jumbo crab. I say "for some reason" because I am not actually a huge fan of crab meat in things. I love crabs. But I think that, at least for me, the whole experience of cracking and picking apart crabs smothered in Old Bay and drinking a beer is what makes crab worthwhile. It should be messy and un-refined. I also really enjoy a good Dungeness crab from time to time, but again it's the experience of eating the whole crab that I really enjoy. I will also occasionally eat crab cake, but I am very picky about my crab cakes. Growing up in Maryland can turn people into total crab cake snobs. I also love soft shell crabs in a number of different preparations (fried Asian soft shell crabs rock my world). But crab on pasta just didn't do it for me. I have wanted to try a pasta with chilis and crab for a long time. And maybe we just didn't do a very good job with it. But I thought the flavor of the chilis totally overpowered the flavor of the crab and the basil. It was fine (and we both cleared our plates), but I wouldn't make it again. Luckily we have just under a pound of crab meat leftover so I think we are going to make some crab cakes for dinner. Here's hoping that the crab cakes turn out better than our pasta...
Recipe after the jump!
What do you do when you have like 3/4 of a pound of Southwestern Pulled Brisket left in the fridge and 3 ripe avocados? You could make more of the same tacos, but that's kind of boring. I guess you could make sandwiches, but that's pretty boring too. We had roughly 20 corn tortillas leftover from the tacos (Alex bought the family-sized package) so it made sense to make more tacos or something that uses tortillas rather than going out to buy bread. I wanted to make migas or breakfast tostadas, but Alex decided (and since he was cooking I couldn't protest too much) that he wanted chilaquiles. By the time I got home from work he had already put together the red chili sauce and fried up the tortillas. I have to say, it's pretty nice to come home to a homemade meal that is already well underway!
The red chili sauce was not my favorite - I thought it was a little bitter/harsh. It had a nice spice level, but I was a little alarmed by my first taste of just the chili sauce-coated tortillas. But the bitterness worked fairly well with the leftover brisket (which was sweet and meaty) and the leftover pickled shallots (which were slightly spicy/sweet and nicely acidic). If you don't have brisket you could try serving with a fried egg (or poached eggs) and the fatty richness of the oozing egg yolk might also work with these chilaquiles. In that case I might add some honey to the red chili sauce to add a little sweetness to counteract the bitterness. I wasn't originally planning on squeezing fresh lime juice on the top of the chilaquiles because I didn't want to make them any soggier than they already were, but I needed the additional freshness, acidity and bright flavor of the lime to really make it work. When I tried another bite of everything after squeezing the lime over the top it all came together nicely.
Recipe after the jump!
Sometime last fall Alex and I tried a Turkish restaurant called Peri Ela on the Upper East Side based on a recommendation from a friend. The food there was pretty good, but my absolute favorite dish that we had there that evening was a dish called yogurtlu chicken adana (which the menu described as "spicy ground chicken, sliced and served over yogurt-garlic and pita bread"). I was essentially picturing a wrap/open-faced sandwich or pizza of some sort, but it was so much better than that. The pita bread was toasted and cut or torn into large croutons and then topped with spicy chicken kebobs, onions and peppers and a garlicky-yogurt sauce. The croutons soaked up the juices from the chicken kebobs and the sauteed onions and and peppers but still retained some of their crunch and texture. The chicken kebobs themselves were nice and flavorful. It was totally spicy, creamy and delicious. Sunday afternoon I picked up some Turkish bread from Zabars and immediately starting thinking about trying to recreate that yogurtlu chicken adana with the bread. Seeing as I am far from an expert on Turkish food I tried to find a recipe to follow online but I couldn't find any. I found plenty of lamb or beef kebob yogurtlu recipes but nothing with chicken. So I decided to just make something up. I always like yogurt-marinated chicken so step 1 was marinating the chicken in labneh, herbs and spices. Step 2 really winging it since I couldn't find a really good recipe to follow. We did take inspiration from the various lamb or beef kebob yogurtlu recipes but from that point we basically threw in whatever ingredients seemed to make sense.
Given that I basically had no idea what I was doing here, I thought the end result was surprisingly successful. The chicken itself was my least favorite part (next time I will tweak the marinade to make it more flavorful or make chicken adana), but the pide soaked in the tomato sauce and yogurt sauce was pretty delicious. While we were eating Alex and I both came to the conclusion that next time we might want to cook the chicken 90% of the way and then add the bread, chicken and tomato sauce to a shallow casserole or baking dish and throw it in the oven for a few minutes. I think that way the bread will absorb more flavor and the dish will just meld together a little better. Even if I don't bake the combined dish in the oven, I will serve the dish in shallow bowl or baking dish because serving it on a plate is just asking for trouble. As Alex and I tried to toss the bread, chicken and sauces all together it was a battle to keep everything on the plate and not fling chicken, etc. everywhere. While our execution wasn't perfect, the flavors were pretty good. I thought the combination of the tangy-ness from the yogurt sauce, the sweetness and slight smoky flavor from the tomato sauce and the heat from the cayenne in the butter sauce worked really nicely together. I was worried that the cauliflower salad would be too heavy/dense to serve with the kebobs but it was surprisingly light. I really liked the lemony dressing, which was bright and fresh but not too acidic. I also liked the slight hint of heat of the crushed red pepper flakes.
Recipes after the jump!
When left to his own devices, if I ask Alex to pick out a recipe for dinner he will pick an Asian (or Asian-influenced) recipe nine times out of ten. I usually go with it, but Sunday night I wasn't in the mood for Asian food. Thursday night Alex and I went to Ma Peche for dinner for upscale Vietnamese-influenced food. Then we made a chicken stir-fry over sizzling rice for dinner on Friday. On Saturday Alex and I took his brother to Biang! in Flushing and then gorged ourselves on dumplings that we picked up in Flushing that evening. And then Sunday afternoon we made a tofu dish from Every Grain of Rice: Simple Chinese Home Cooking. Enough already. Don't get me wrong - I love Asian food. But sometimes I want to experiment with other cuisines. I crave variety. So I called an audible on the brisket recipe that Alex had selected (braised brisket with star anise, soy, etc.) and declared that we were making a brisket taco recipe I found on Smitten Kitchen instead. The recipe at Smitten Kitchen called for cooking the brisket in the slow cooker for 8-10 hours but I was too lazy to get the slow cooker out of storage so we decided to braise it in the oven instead. In some ways I wish we had used the slow cooker because the brisket might have been more tender, but whatever. It might also have helped with the tenderness if we bought a brisket with slightly more fat on it. Our brisket was fairly lean, but I wasn't going to hit the grocery store again for a fattier piece.
This dish was one where each element contributed to the final dish in some crucial way. When I sampled each component I wasn't blown away by any of them. But when you combine them something really delicious happens. The brisket was sweet, meaty and (relatively) tender. It represented one of the few instances where I thought that molasses did wonderful things to a dish by providing depth of flavor and sweetness, without being too overpowering. The slaw and the pickled shallots added some much needed heat and acidity to the tacos. I really liked the combinatation of olive oil and mayo in the slaw because it added moisture and creaminess without cooling the slaw down too much and making it heavy and mayo-laden. As a side note, this isn't a slaw that I would eat on its own - I think it is a little aggressively spicy for that (perhaps if I used one chili it would be better for snacking), but it was the perfect slaw to serve on top of (or with) the brisket to really kick it up a notch.
Recipes after the jump!
We are currently on a bit of a Korean kick. We made six (Belated) Chinese New Year meals (I know that I still owe you guys one (Belated) Chinese New Year meal) and then a bunch of southeast Asian meals. Now we have cycled through to Korean or Korean-inspired meals. Randomly enough, we even went out to dinner at a Korean restaurant last night. The inspiration for this meal actually came from a vegan food truck that I like called The Cinnamon Snail. About a month ago I tried one of their dishes that they served with a kale salad. I liked the dish, but I liked the kale salad better. And two weeks ago I tried another of their dishes (Korean barbeque seitan) that also had kale in it. The kale in both dishes had a spicy vaugly Korean flavor to it. When I noticed how nice the Tuscan kale looked at Fairway last week I decided to buy a few bunches and try to make a Korean-y kale salad. And then I started thinking that if I was going to do a Korean-y kale salad I could probably figure out some sort of Korean-y seafood recipe to go with it. Cod immediately came to mind and I went home and did some Google research and came up with these two recipes. The kale salad (recipe available here) wasn't eactly what I was looking for, but I figured it was easy and would give me somewhere to start. I wanted to add some salted cashews but by the time I got home and went for the cashews Alex told he he had finished them off as his afternoon snack. Oh well.
Both dishes were a little salty for me, but otherwise good. I thought the cod had nice flavor - a little spicy, a little sweet. I liked it. Our cod fell apart when I tried to flip it but we have a pretty good habit of ruining fish so there is nothing new there. Alex massacred one of our Dover sole filets the other night too. At least he only destroyed one fillet - I managed to destroy both here (although I reassembled one of them nicely for the photos). I am going to keep working on the salad to perfect it. I like kale salads better when the kale is cut into thin strips (I find it easier to eat that way), although I left the kale in larger pieces for this recipe because it was going to be sauteed briefly in the warm dressing. In the future I would probably skip the step of sauteing the kale in the warm dressing and if I wanted to wilt the kale down, I would make a warm dressing and pour it over top of the kale (like this Korean-Style Romaine).
Recipes after the jump!
